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On this, the last day of the month, the hottest in the year, I find the word all wrong to use. It scorches: screechingly, searingly, tearing into my flesh with a canine sizzle as I inhale the vapors of the humid bodies standing in weary line and try to muster images of a New York spring behind closed eyes with squiggles of translucence drifting to the boundaries, trapped within my field of vision, in much the same way as my body remains grounded while the spirit readies itself to nose-dive into an achingly green patch in an unbusy corner of Central Park.

A long, long while ago, in what almost seems like another lifetime, I scribbled a desultory little something for the Caferati Quick Tales contest. The days passed, and then weeks and months, and The Story of Little Post slipped out of immediate memory.

Apparently, not everyone is as absent-minded as I. The good judges at Quick Tales found my story worthy of shortlisting and here it is, among other keen contenders for the People’s Choice Prize Poll.

Now here’s where you come in. If you like it enough, act on it. Rate it on a scale of 1 to 10 (with 10 being the highest score). Obviously, the story with the highest (and most) ratings wins the People’s Choice Poll. But first, please take a brief moment to join Live Journal. Only LJ members can poll. The poll will remain open for at least 2 weeks from October 28, 2008. For more information on how to go about it, click here.

I understand it may be painful to sign up and rate when it’s so much easier to peacefully lurk and then click the browser shut, but flex that wrist a little. Please? It may not be the best 500 word fiction of all time, but I’d really appreciate feedback all the same.

It stumbled out stiltedly, the awkward syllables elbowing each other in an upward bound elevator; and as it floated away into the ether, I stared after it like I would a stranger, barely able to recognize the word I had once passionately moaned.

Little B, 2 years and 4 months old, with cheeks that threaten to fall off his face, is comfortably settled on my lap, a fairly routine location in his busy daily schedule. From this perch, he views his beloved ‘fissees’ on my computer, after which he will toddle off to his classroom to seek higher learning. Since his family is known to me, I usually ask after them:

“When she first noticed Abhiveer’s gaze on her, she had been shooing pigeons off her potted hydrangeas. When months later, he showed no signs of dropping it, she acquiesced, and hesitantly asked Rina di to arrange a formal meeting. His intense grey corneas were her last memory as her own eyes blurred and sank into silence.”

As the voice trailed off, Noyonika removed her sunglasses, wiped tears that she hadn’t noticed emerge, and thanked her reading assistant for repeating her mother’s biography.